Abstract: “This paper aims to provide an optimum and reliable thermal design of a solar powered absorption cooling system in United Arab Emirates (UAE). A numerical algorithm was developed to compute the cooling capacity of the solar powered absorption system under the influence of several operating conditions, namely; hourly global radiation, flow rate, and the inlet generator temperature as well as investigating the associated environmental aspects. The proposed cooling system configuration consists basically of flat plate collectors, a stratified storage tank and an absorption chiller. A predictive model was programmed and simulated using INSEL software in order to analyse the performance of the system throughout summer season. A peak cooling demand of 20kW was estimated using Hourly Analysis Program (HAP) for a villa based in Dubai, UAE. Theobtained results showed that a minimum of about 50% of the power from the peak demand can be provided by the solar system during high levels of radiation.”

Keywords: solar cooling, absorption chiller, INSEL.